POLITICS: U.S. Praises Colombia at OAS Meet

[Judi Lynn]

Source: IPS News

POLITICS: U.S. Praises Colombia at OAS Meet
By Michael Flynn

MEDELLIN, Colombia, Jun 3 (IPS) - Stressing U.S. commitment to the Colombian government's controversial efforts to rid the country of "narcoterrorists", which have included briefly invading a neighbouring country to attack guerrilla forces, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte said Monday that Colombia was "an outstanding example" of what can be achieved through a commitment to democracy and good governance.

Negroponte was speaking at a press conference during the 38th General Assembly of the Organisation of American States (OAS) in this Colombian city. Asked whether Washington would intervene in the growing diplomatic dispute between Colombia and its neighbours Venezuela and Ecuador, both of which have been accused of assisting Colombia's FARC guerrillas, Negroponte said that direct U.S. intervention was "not necessary, even if we were inclined" to get involved.

Regarding Colombia's attack on a FARC camp just across the border in Ecuador in early March, the event which spurred the diplomatic crisis between Colombia and its neighbours, Negroponte said very little. The attack, which the OAS condemned in a March resolution as a "violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ecuador and of principles of international law", has put an uncomfortable glare on Washington's outspoken support for the Alvaro Uribe government.

Negroponte glossed over the issue, saying that for the United States there are two key concerns in the growing Andean dispute: sovereignty and the right of a country to defend itself. Negroponte said that it was the responsibility of neighbouring countries not to allow insurgent forces on their territory.


Read more: http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42641

---

http://www.nndb.com.nyud.net:8090/people/813/000044681/negroponte.jpg

[SpiralHawk]

1. "We republicons luvs us our totalitarian cronies. Smirk." - Commander AWOL

[dipsydoodle]

2. Well they would

wouldn't they. Its called vested interest.

[LynnTheDem]

3. "U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte"

Criminals running this nation. I still can't get over this one. Neither can the rest of the world, but at least they know now for fact what they've always suspected about us.

[EFerrari]

8. Negroponte is a serial killer.

The last 8 years has been like that nightmare where you can't wake up.

[sam sarrha]

4. it was the least they could do.. Columbia has murdered more Union people than all others combined,

[sam sarrha]

5. have you noticed that Bu$h has more "Monkey" mouth lately, than he uaually does..??

[Judi Lynn]

6. Colombia's Horrific Labor Abuses Are Among a Long List of Reasons to Oppose the Colombia FTA

Colombia's Horrific Labor Abuses Are Among a Long List of Reasons to Oppose the Colombia FTA

1. Spring 2008: Uribe government ties to right-wing paramilitaries and union murders exposed

• In 2008, Colombia remains the most dangerous country in the world in which to be a trade unionist. The number of unionists murdered in Colombia in the first quarter of 2008 is nearly double that of the first quarter of 2007, with 17 killed. During the presidency of Álvaro Uribe alone (August 7, 2002 – present), 434 unionists have been murdered – one fourth of these were highly visible union leaders. Indeed, in every year, more unionists are murdered in Colombia than in the rest of the world combined. According to Colombia's National Labor School, the leading source on the topic, over 2,571 trade unionists have been killed since 1986.
  
  
• government has not been a neutral or benevolent actor in Colombia's human rights nightmare. Uribe was referred to in a 1991 U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency report as a drug trafficker and a "close personal friend" of drug baron Pablo Escobar. More recently, this spring, the controversial Colombian president has been under federal investigation in Colombia for accusations of helping right-wing paramilitaries plan a 1997 massacre of 15 people. And Uribe's former intelligence chief, Jorge Noguera, is under investigation for handing over lists to paramilitaries of union leaders and other left-wing figures who were singled out for assassination.
  
  
• In April, Colombian prosecutors ordered the arrest of Mario Uribe, the president's cousin and closest political ally, who presided over the Colombian Senate and is accused of ties to paramilitary groups. Mario Uribe then sought political asylum in the Costa Rican embassy in Bogotá, which denied his request as "inadmissible." The Colombian Supreme Court has identified paramilitary ties to 65 current and former members of the Colombian Congress. Thirty-two lawmakers have been detained so far, with 26 of these from Uribe's governing coalition. Thirty-three additional legislators are under investigation, including 29 from Uribe's coalition. These include Nancy Gutierrez, a leader in Uribe's political party who serves in a position equivalent to that of House Speaker. To relate this to the U.S. context, it would be as if the president, Senate majority leader, and House speaker were all simultaneously convicted or under investigation for ties to terrorist groups.
  
  
• The Uribe administration often claims to have "demobilized" right-wing paramilitaries. But Colombian officials have documented a shift of former paramilitaries into new gangs with different names, whose ranks number up to 5,000 people. These groups continue to murder civilians and engage in drug trafficking. For instance, on March 6, 2008 human rights groups held a peaceful rally in Bogota against paramilitary violence. In the lead-up to the march, Uribe's principal advisor (and Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar's cousin) José Obdulio Gaviria responded by repeatedly and publicly labeling these protestors as Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) supporters, including in a national radio broadcast. On March 11, a paramilitary gang called the Black Eagles sent out death threats that named 28 of the human rights defenders collectively denounced by Gaviria. Four trade unionists associated with the march were assassinated, as were many other civil society leaders, and many others have been threatened, beaten and harassed.
  
  
• Human rights groups have also documented an increasing trend of extrajudicial killings of civilians by the Colombian military, who then plant FARC paraphernalia on the victims' bodies to pass them off as guerrillas. According to the Los Angeles Times, "A macabre facet of a general increase in ‘extrajudicial killings' by the military, ‘false positives' are a result of intense pressure to show progress in Colombia's U.S.-funded war against leftist insurgents… The killings have increased in recent years amid an emphasis on rebel death tolls as the leading indicator of military success, the human rights groups say. Even Colombian officials acknowledge that soldiers and their commanders have been given cash and promotions for upping their units' body countsMore:
  http://www.citizen.org/publications/release.cfm?ID=7585&secID=1152&catID=126
  

[Judi Lynn]

7. Colombia's Uribe refuses to rule out third term

Colombia's Uribe refuses to rule out third term
04 Jun 2008 21:41:43 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Hugh Bronstein

BOGOTA, June 4 (Reuters) - Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, whose "Democratic Security" policies have put leftist rebels on the defensive and sparked economic growth, refused on Wednesday to rule out a third run for office.

Uribe, elected in 2002 and re-elected in 2006 after Congress passed a constitutional amendment allowing a second term, is flirting with running again in 2010. This would require another change in law.

"We seek to assure the re-election of Democratic Security and investor confidence," Uribe told local radio when asked if he would like to run again, declining to endorse allies such as Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos who are possible candidates.

Colombia, in the grips of a four-decade-old guerrilla insurgency funded by the cocaine trade, is home to regular political violence against trade unionists and others suspected of pro-rebel sympathies.

More:
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N04307701.htm